Lester Ismore - or is it not? (and things sucking creative energy etc.)

["Rainer Thelonius Balthasar Straschill" <rs@moinlabs.de>]

Hi everyone,

having followed the discussion for some time now, I'd like to chime in with
my (rather gear-heavy) pov:

Leaving the gear-schlepping topic aside for one moment (which most of the
time is actually something that matters a lot whether a certain setup will
work or not), it's rather like this: more (and more complex) gear gives you
more options, but also needs more time to learn (and sometimes to maintain)
the thing: If you had a guitar with one string and five frets per string,
this would greatly simplify learning the guitar, but then again limit you 
in
your expression, and the same is true for our setups.

Now there may be a difference if your use of effects is rather superficial
and/or decided on in advance. If you need chorus in two tunes, a flanger in
another and play all of that with your vintage Tele sound, then you'd most
probably won't need Ted's rig. Then again, when you play punk, the bass
guitar with one string and five frets may be sufficient, too...

So how much do the things suck creative energy? I believe the do hinder the
creative process if using your effects will require some very conscious
interaction with your setup, as opposed to doing it inutively. To take 
again
the example of the guitarist, I guess for a guitarist (which I am not,
although I do play the guitar), the way from a chord progression or melody
appearing in your mind to your fingers playing that very idea is an almost
unconscious one. The same need be true for the way from that "swirling
effect on that stuttering loop" idea to the necessary button/pedal presses
and fader moves. If that is not the case you need to a) improve the user
interface of your setup and/or b) learn to play your electronic things
better.

Improving the user interface is that one are where for me the use of
computers has brought a huge advantage over traditional hardware boxes. For
most of the hardware effects I have, controlling more than eight parameters
with assignable controllers is a real hassle, and that's something that is
not true for nearly all VST/VSTi things in a proper host. Even programming
the controller mapping is easier here most of the time. And with the
computer, you really have a great degree of freedom if not for the display
of information, but for the user commands, and it's really all in one 
place.

The process for my computer setup (where I use a BCR2000 fader box and
FCB1010 foot controller) was (in a simplified way) something like this:
1) Identify some "emergency"/always-needed-quickly operations - they need a
dedicated control (e.g. footswitch).
2) identify continuous controllers that need to be accessed while playing 
an
instrument with both hands - these need to be accessed with an expression
pedal.
3) identify button pushes that need to be accessed while playing an
instrument with both hands - these will be accessed with footswitches.
4) identify the complete number of controllers (not belonging to group 1 
and
2) you need to access.
5) define how they need to be grouped (in preset settings or banks), and 
how
they can be made similair to each other (e.g. the bottom left knob is 
always
filter cutoff or something).
6) identify "most-used" functions and group them together in a preset/bank
in addition to them residing in dedicated banks/presets.
7) find the most-used "paths" between banks/presets and organize
banks/presets so these paths can be travelled with the minimum amount of
button presses.

After implementing that, it's time to learn the assingment and test-drive
it, and all the while looking at the following:
* are there functions you miss?
* are there functions you don't access at all?
* are the "paths" laid out in a good way?
* do the "most-used" and "accessing-while-playing" assignments make sense?

And apart from that, it's really a lot of learning - a big part of it being
sitting down with the sheets of controller assignment you printed out and
learning them.

(As a sidenote for those who'd seen me play Y2K6, the setup here included 
10
banks of FCB1010 assignments (10 buttons and 20 exp pedal assignment each) 
=
300, plus 16 presets on the BCR2000 (whis is I believe 106 assignments per
preset), plus some buttons on the computer keyboard, plus a dedicated
footswitch as a "panic" switch, plus an exp pedal and a sustain pedal for
the keyboard. A guessed percentage of more than 90% of the controller
actions was done using 2 presets and 2 banks, respectively, but if I
accessed some of the remaining ~1600 controllers, I was really happy I had
them (and had learned them) - and was also happy that it is by far easier 
to
access them that way than by delving into the menu structure of a Eclipse 
or
FireworX (let alone a Wavestation...).

So what do I do when I just want to play a simple loop with some effects
added to it? Use the G2.1u and the DD20 (currently, a SMM w/Hazari and a 
KP3
sits in that minisetup, but I really rarely use any of these two - yes, for
that specific performance approach, less is perhaps not more but it's all
that is needed).


And with that said, I'd like to encourage Greg to construct his planned big
setup (perhaps only to find out which stuff you don't use that much after
all), and like to thank Ted for the VG-99 recommendation - after being
somewhat disappointed with what the V-Bass does, this may be something
better after all (and then I'd need a GK pickup on my guitar...).

All the best,

        Rainer